Drone startup Hoverfly Technologies Inc. is nearly doubling in size.
Hoverfly on April 25 cut the ribbon on its new 20,500-square-foot headquarters in Sanford after moving from its previous 11,000-square-foot building on March 1. The facility, which acts as Hoverfly’s primary research and design/design space, means the company will add 50 workers to its staff of 60.
Twelve-year-old Hoverfly makes tethered drones for the U.S. military, as well as security and public safety companies and agencies. By connecting to a power source, the drones can stay in the air indefinitely without having to come down to recharge. They’re commonly used by the military as a radio antenna that can fly above buildings or land features that would interfere with a signal.
The new facility not only includes office space but also lab space, a Faraday cage where Hoverfly can test frequency interference in an isolated area, a 3D printer for prototyping parts and plenty of room outdoors to fly drones.
To see inside the facility, check out the slideshow above.
It also provides space for the 50 new jobs the company expects to create. Those jobs will pay an average annual wage of $60,376, which is 20% higher than the county's average wage of $50,314. The company currently has four open jobs listed on its website.
A former University of Central Florida Business Incubation Program client, Hoverfly previously operated out of an 11,000-square-foot building near UCF. However, it outgrew the old space, and searched dozens of properties around Central Florida before landing on the building at 800 Central Park Drive, said founder and Chief Technology Officer Al Ducharme.
Officials with the city of Sanford and Seminole County, as well as regional economic development folks, attended the grand opening to praise the high-tech, high-wage job growth Hoverfly is bringing to the area.
Orlando Economic Partnership Vice President of Business Development Casey Barnes called Hoverfly an “economic development person’s dream."
Further, Sanford Economic Development Director Tom Tomerlin offered his own reason the city is a good fit for Hoverfly: “Drones fly better in Sanford."
Hoverfly is far from the only company selling drone technology to the U.S. Department of Defense. The department’s fiscal year 2022 budget includes an estimated $8.2 billion for unmanned vehicles, up $700 million from the year before, according to nonprofit organization Association for Uncrewed Vehicle Systems International. The U.S. military is the biggest customer for uncrewed systems technology, such as drones.
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